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One year ago, with Donald J. Trump freshly installed in the White House for a second presidential term, a scandal-ridden Eric Adams losing his grip on New York City and former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo favored in the race to replace him as mayor, hundreds of progressive Jewish New Yorkers held a street-side Seder to protest all of them.
“No Fascists, No Pharaohs,” read some of the signs at the event, which featured the appearance of two long-shot mayoral candidates, Zohran Mamdani and Brad Lander.
The so-called Seder in the Streets returned on Monday, and Mr. Mamdani again appeared — the first time a sitting mayor has attended the event, hosted by a left-wing group, Jews for Racial & Economic Justice.
“Celebrating Passover together is also an opportunity for New Yorkers at large to celebrate the lessons Passover leaves all of us across these five boroughs — lessons of hope, overcoming fear,” Mr. Mamdani told the crowd near Union Square in Manhattan. His audience included a flock of onlookers who had sprinted over after seeing the mayor.
In the audience, people passed around pieces of matzo; at the front, various rabbis and Mr. Lander, also making a return appearance, raised and blessed four glasses of wine. Two older women wore signs that read, “Defeating tyrants since Pharaoh.”
The gathering came as tensions divided the Jewish community, with synagogues ruptured over support for Israel and schools and community centers sharing fears about rising antisemitism, especially after a driver rammed a truck into a large synagogue outside Detroit. Last month, a man tied to a pro-Israel terrorist organization was arrested in connection with what officials described as a plot to assassinate the leader of one of New York’s most active groups of pro-Palestinian demonstrators.
Mr. Mamdani’s team emphasized that visiting the progressive Passover gathering was just one of the ways that the mayor had observed the holiday. He attended the long-running “Downtown Seder” at City Winery, distributed food boxes with the Orthodox group Chasdei Lev and took time to look at a Haggadah, the book with the text of the Seder, that dates to the Civil War. He was also hosting a Seder on Monday night for city workers at Gracie Mansion, according to a spokeswoman for the mayor.
“Mayor Mamdani has spent this Passover season engaging a broad spectrum of New York City’s Jewish community — from Orthodox leaders in Flatbush to sending a letter to Rikers inmates to today’s JFREJ Seder in the Streets,” said Phylisa Wisdom, who runs the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism.
Mr. Mamdani, since first announcing his run for office, has come under scrutiny from Jewish community leaders, with hundreds of rabbis from across the country opposing his run for office because of his longtime support for the Palestinian cause. Many progressive Jews have been staunch in their support for the mayor, with hundreds knocking doors as part of “Jews for Zohran” during the campaign.
Some of the rabbis who are wary of Mr. Mamdani were critical of his appearance at the progressive Seder event.
“The mayor needs to determine at some point that if he wants a relationship with the Jewish community, he needs to have a relationship with the majority of New York Jews,” said Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, senior rabbi of Stephen Wise Free Synagogue. “This organization is legitimate and relevant, but it doesn’t represent the majority of American Jews and New York Jews.”
The Seder in the Streets gathering this year focused on the “New York for All” Act, a state bill that would prohibit collaboration between state or local officials and immigration agents. The State Senate majority leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins, has said that the bill is among her top priorities.
Ms. Wisdom said Mr. Mamdani “sees Passover as a reminder of both the resilience of the Jewish people and our shared responsibility to fight for freedom and repair a broken world.”
Mark Bryk, 33, standing in the crowd, said the mayor’s presence seemed of a piece with Mr. Mamdani’s broader strategy.
“It’s not just in this place — he shows up to all sorts of places, including Jewish places and not just leftist ones,” Mr. Bryk said. “I think it’s a powerful message.”